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Simplifying E-Commerce One ‘Touch’ at a Time

Many smartphone owners browse online retailers but do not make purchases with their devices. Fingerprint readers and other third-party mobile payment services could convert these browsers to buyers.

Have you ever tried to pay for an online purchase using your mobile device under less than ideal circumstances—while riding on public transportation, for instance, as you are jostled from side to side?

“When paying for purchases on a mobile device, you’re presented with a long list of information you need to fill in to complete the transaction,” says Paul Lee, head of global technology, media, and telecommunications (TMT) research at Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (Deloitte Global).

“When you’re on a computer with a keyboard, providing e-commerce payment information is a chore, but doable. But if you’re on a mobile device, it can be almost impossible, and that’s even before the phone’s predictive text kicks in,” he says.

Enter “touch commerce,” which enables a customer to make a secure first-time or subsequent payment on any merchant’s website or app without providing registration or log-in details to the merchant or payment service. “With a single touch of a fingerprint or a couple of touches of a mobile device screen, you can complete a transaction,” Lee says.

Deloitte Global research finds that touch commerce will likely grow 150 percent, to 50 million regular users, by the end of 2016. Hundreds of millions of smartphones, tablets, and even some PCs already have built-in fingerprint readers; this year, Deloitte Global expects another half-billion devices to join those ranks. Users whose devices lack fingerprint readers can still participate in touch commerce via third-party touch-based mobile payment services that can prepopulate credit card information, shipping address, and other information in online forms. This allows retailers to quickly authenticate the user, enabling fast, largely frictionless mobile purchasing.

“We expect touch-based mobile e-commerce to become more and more prevalent,” Lee says. “Making transactions as easy as possible for consumers will increasingly become a competitive differentiator for retailers.”

In this TMT Predictions 2016 video, Paul Lee and Duncan Stewart, director of TMT research for Deloitte Canada, discuss how touch-based mobile e-commerce might evolve this year and beyond.

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